A Sense of Place: CITY SIDEWALK – taste

A Sense of Place

In his essay ‘So:ba’, given at the International Haiku Conference (SUNY Plattsburgh, NY, 2008) and published serially in Frogpond, Jim Kacian discusses the concept of ba:

“If you look up ba in any Japanese-English Dictionary you’ll find it means “place” or “site” or “occasion”. And these are all true in the most general sense—ba is a pointer to a kind of awareness that something of importance is happening in time and space.”

So here we are…

In the following weeks we will get back to haiku basics and explore specific locations with an emphasis on the senses, and with the intention of improving our own haiku practice. Ideally, participants will select an actual location that they can visit, or a location from memory that they have visited in the past. Failing that, we always have our imaginations – and you’re invited to join in the fun! Submit an original unpublished poem (or poems) via our Contact Form by Sunday midnight on the theme of the week, including your name as you would like it to appear, and place of residence. I will select from these for the column, and add commentary.

next week’s theme: CITY SIDEWALK – touch

Our final installment of ‘A Sense of Place’ is our final exploration of city sidewalks – if possible, the same sidewalk as in previous weeks – but now we explore the sense of touch… what does it feel like? The deadline for this theme is midnight Pacific Time, Sunday 23 December 2018.

I look forward to reading your submissions.

A Sense of Place: CITY SIDEWALK – taste

Many thanks to all of you who continue to contribute both submissions and comments here on the blog post during this busy holiday season!

The following poets each approach the topic a different way – from a taste of a city to a taste of the past… even a fly takes a bite!

the streets of Istanbul
I hunt in the dictionary
for a synonym of cliché

Radostina Dragostinova

ice cream
plops onto the walk
one dip left

Randy Brooks

scavenging urchins –
their eyes full of taste
of cold leftovers

Rashmi Vesa

baci sul marciapiede:
si scioglie in bocca la cioccolata

kisses on the sidewalk:
the chocolate melts in your mouth

Ravaglia Giuliana

tearing off pieces
of sourdough bread
walking near the bay

Rehn Kovacic

chimney cake –
the way she sticks out
her tongue

Réka Nyitrai

berkeley farmers’ market –
bittersweet nibbles
from a summer stroll

robyn brooks
usa

dry Manhattan
three briny olives taste
night’s Old Port

ron scully

dodging traffic
that cappuccino
I’d die for

Ronald K. Craig
Batavia, OH USA

street food –
a glass of beer in one hand
a meatball in the other

Rosa Maria Di Salvatore

city sidewalk
a little taste
of freedom

Ruth Powell

bending down to tie my shoe
I taste the exhaust fumes
from the food truck

Sari Grandstaff
Saugerties, NY, USA

native street
the taste of ice cream
is the same as in childhood

Serhiy Shpychenko
Kyiv, UA

the sidewalk whitens
in a bronze leaf
I wrap my gum

simonj
UK

young couple
under the umbrella –
the taste of kiss

Slobodan Pupovac
Zagreb, Croatia

city scape
past the sidewalk window
the taste of something more

Stephen A. Peters

even the crow
celebrates Christmas
sidewalk cookie crumbs

Susan Rogers
Los Angeles, CA, USA

lick sticky fingers
late to work again
breakfast on the run

Trilla Pando

sunny day…
white puppy tastes
white snow

Tsanka Shishkova

caroling
house-to-house…
sugar cookies

Valentina Ranaldi-Adams
Fairlawn, Ohio

sidewalk hawker
a fly keen to taste candyfloss
kid’s sugary lips

Vishnu Kapoor

sea gulls
the salty avenue
lined with beer mugs

Wilfredo Bongcaron

Katherine Munro lives in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, and publishes under the name kjmunro. She is Membership Secretary for Haiku Canada and an Associate Member of the League of Canadian Poets. She recently co-edited an anthology of crime-themed haiku called Body of Evidence: a collection of killer ’ku.

An amazing amount of tastes here. A great selection, Kathy. Well done to all poets. I enjoyed reading them all.
.
lamp-lit pools…
the nooks and crannies
of sequestered candy
Alan Summers
.
When I first read this my initial thoughts were of the nice things, when children, the surprises put by for a special event. But with more thought, and I maybe going in the wrong direction here, ‘lamp-lit pools’ gives me a vision of distant memories of a childhood, and ‘sequestered candy’ a sweetness taken away. This is so deep, and for me needs a lot more thought.
An intense read.
.
walking…
the taste of solitude
in just one word
Anna Maria Domburg- Sancristoforo
.
There are times when being alone can be sweet, then there’s other times…
.
a lick for you
and a lick for me
ice cream with puppy
Christina Sng
.
Love this, reminds me of a holiday I took on the Pembroke coast with my dogs. A chocolate ice cream treat while sitting above the harbour wall 🙂
.
I walk
people smile
chocolate on my face
Davis gale
.
This made me smile. One of those embarrassing moments when we know nothing 🙂 so funny.
A bit like when a lady has the back of her skirt, accidently, tucked into her underwear.
.
beneath food stall
a stray cat chews
the leftover bones
Hifsa Ashraf
.
So many images of unwanted pets left to go feral. What I ask myself, here, is ‘stray cat’ the only living thing that chews on the left overs of the more affluent members of society.
.
back alley
a stray dog
feeds her litter
Joanne van Helvoort
.
Again the same could be seen as the above.
‘a pet isn’t just a gift, it’s a commitment’
.
discarded kebab
the homeless man splits it
with his dog
John Mc Manus
.
This verse brought back a memory I witnessed when waiting for the coach back to Wales from Victoria station, London. A very, vey thin man started to rummage through a bin near a food outlet. He found some discarded chips and a half eaten roll of some-sort, and unravelled the paper and started to eat it. I’ve seen people on the street in the local towns asking for a few shillings, and sharing food with their dogs, but rummaging through bins for food shocked me, its an image I will never forget.
.
chilli cheese dog
I wear more
than I eat
Margaret Walker
.
Well, I can see this in two ways, either the sauce has dripped down the front of your clothes or a the saying goes ‘another mouthful, another pound’ (on the hips of course)
A nice bit of humour 🙂
.
You’re doing a marvellous job, Kathy. Have a wonderful Christmas and a great New Year.
The same to all you poets 🙂

lamp-lit pools…
the nooks and crannies
of sequestered candy
.
Alan Summers
.
When I first read this my initial thoughts were of the nice things, when children, the surprises put by for a special event. But with more thought, and I maybe going in the wrong direction here, ‘lamp-lit pools’ gives me a vision of distant memories of a childhood, and ‘sequestered candy’ a sweetness taken away. This is so deep, and for me needs a lot more thought.
An intense read.
.
.
Wow! 🙂
.
When I wrote this, I didn’t see what you saw, but I think you are right, I was subconsciously doing this.
.
I do worry sometimes that some of my haiku are ‘intense’ and not easy-reading. 🙂

I’ve noted that for me, the City Sidewalk series has often focused on the plight of the homeless. I’m not sure why that is such a strong association, but some of my own responses to these prompts have gone in that direction, and some of the ones I’ve found most impactful from others as well.

John McManus – discarded kebab/ the homeless man splits it / with his dog

is a perfect example.

Also, as someone who hasn’t lived much of life in the city, I feel the isolation inherent in those crowds, as Michael Henry Lee so well captures

big city sidewalk / the taste of being alone / in the crowd

And I love the glimpses others give me of different moments or perspectives, especially the humorous ones…

I feel that because homeless people are increasing in great numbers, and getting younger and younger, and our governments allow them to die, and crowd the streets, it’s the main feature of most shop lined streets alas.
.
John McManus’s haiku highlights the generosity of many homeless people. Some have helped me, or my wife (who had severe M.E. and couldn’t make it to a taxi one day).
.
For the second time this year shamefully British politicians stepped over a dying homeless person by one of the busiest doors at Parliament, in London.
.
I’ve lost many homeless friends to the cold, to sepsis (police dog bites or cuts) and some people are kicking, urinating, or cutting up the homeless.
.
It’s really all we can see, and our governments bicker over insignificant slights and points of view.
.
.
curling up at dusk
the park bench sleeper
turns over a new page
.
Alan Summers
1st Prize, Fellowship of Australian Writers, Queensland, International Haiku Contest (1996)
.
.
sunlit sweat
the young vagrant
sucks a thumb
.
Alan Summers
Does Fish-God Know (YTBN Press 2012)
The Haiku Foundation’s Per Diem: Daily Haiku December 2012 (31 poems): Children
.

I feel the milk of human kindness is evaporating in some quarters. Karen and myself helped a young woman who escaped domestic abuse, and in shock, due to prescribed meds, she didn’t have the money for tampons. My wife went with her to a shop, and bought her various things, and money for food, and she went into shelter and is now rehoused. For that lady, thousands have society turn their back on them, and institutions are going back to Dickensian times. It doesn’t have to be that way.

Your words, and the things we see on the TV make me wonder what is happening in our world. During an appeal advert, which there are so many these days not only for humans but animals, too. At the end of one there was a little child, no more than three years old, sitting hunched in a cardboard box in the middle of a busy street, and no one took any notice, not here in the UK, but non the less, what ever is happening to human compassion around the world.

Thanks Carol.
.
At one time, in my youth, we mostly saw the occasional tramp, someone who was eccentric, sometimes an ex-professor even. We now have people born as citizens who are either economic or abused refugees in their own country: Causes created by successive venal politicians and super-businesses as well as violent spouses. From a rare appearance on the British street, we now have children and adults regularly homeless and the main visual image we register rather than shops and banter in those shops.
.
Decent manners, integrity, compassion are seen as weaknesses and wrong in general. Such a shame. I’ll personally continue to be weak, and forcefully remind myself to be someone with at least some empathy.

A depressing read, but true. what a mess the world is in. If only a brake could be put on to allow everything and everyone to slow down and take a good look at the mess we humans have made…maybe one day women will be in the ‘power’ seats around the world, you never know there just could be a lot more compassion, who knows, such a massive issue.
Thanks for that thought provoking reply.
.
Love that last paragraph.

Stephen’s: city scape / past the sidewalk window / the taste of something more, intrigues me. I want to read it over and over. I imagine a low level employee of some kind, hurrying on an errand, catching a glimpse of some luxury displayed in a window, and dreaming. A well-crafted hint of meaning.

Thank you for all your commendable work in putting together this very inspiring series every week, Kathy! For someone new to the genre, it has been a great learning experience for me. Thanks for including my poems and for the times you’ve chosen some of mine for commentary, as well.
I particularly like Michael Henry Lee’s
big city sidewalk
the taste of being alone
in the crowd
Being alone in a city sidewalk crowd, I savor the taste of freedom, adventure and sometimes, the pleasure of my own company!
My hats off to all poets in the series!

Thanks, Kathy, for including my poem. Every one was fun to read, but I would like to highlight two that skillfully used the element of surprise in Line 3:
sidewalk vendor
the taste of figgy pudding
in a plastic cup (Michael H. Lester)

Not everyone this week concentrated on ‘taste’ as in how things are savoured on the tongue — the gustatory perception (ghastly-sounding phrase). I enjoyed especially those that took a different angle: taste as in one’s own judgement, a sort of philosophy of perception. I admire Roberta Beary’s ‘aloneless’ (rather than loneliness), even though it covers both senses of taste. Similarly, Michael Henry Lee’s ‘the taste of being alone in a crowd’. Then there’s Ruth’s ‘a little taste of freedom’ , which could speak volumes, and Michele’s fashion observation, ‘sleeker silhouette’. There were several others in this mix.
.
kj’s forum has taught me several things as a relative newcomer/late starter to the short poem genre, and one of them, through so many examples from all you experts, is how to look at subjects from a lateral point of view. Dig deep, find something new! The choice seems endless.
.
Thank you Kathy for including my contribution, even though when I re-read what I had submitted, it is grammatically incorrect …oops!
.
And so on to ‘feeling’! Sixth sense, maybe?!

Ingrid–
You’ve highlighted several things I also have found from all these sensory excursions. After thinking I’ve considered the topic from every way possible, I’m always surprised and amazed and delighted by all the angles that never occurred to me. A truly rich form–as is this forum.

As for your fine haiku–
sidewalk café
rounds of raki
warms the cockles of the heart

No worries about the grammar–a stickler could take it as the raki talking, or the “warms” could refer not to the rounds but to the whole experience itself.
best,
Laurie Greer

Dear Kathy,
The essence of all mix – put in the jar of this blog, we all taste and drink. Thanks to your meticulous efforts, dear Kathy. Happy to see mine .After all said and done, ” being alone in the crowd” is something with a different relish. I agree with Michael Henry Lee.

I’m so glad to see Pris Campbell’s
.
last bus
grilled pretzels with mustard
and I forget
.
I love this! To me this is a rare example of a postmodern haiku which tests some boundaries but also works excellently as a haiku. Perhaps Radostina Dragostinova’s
.
the streets of Istanbul
I hunt in the dictionary
for a synonym of cliché
.
is also a postmodern haiku.

I very much enjoy this Weekly Wednesday Haiku Smorgasbord. I find it interesting to read the selected haiku which focus on one specific image and setting as well as those whose images are more abstract. For me, the former is a borrowed painting I can view again and again, as in Carmen Sterba’s:

slippery sidewalks –
warming myself
with starbucks tea

while the latter is a page torn from a novel, one that is subject to myriad interpretations with each reading, as in Ruth Powell’s:

What insightful ways to relish haiku: as “a borrowed painting” to be returned to or “a page torn from a novel,” with multiple interpretations. For me, giving words to experience like that, widens and deepens it. Thanks, Roberta.